Energy

The North Dakota Industrial Commission has approved some tweaks to the Commission’s natural gas flaring rules.

"We think that refocusing our efforts on stranded gas, and on people who are not meeting gas capture goals, while keeping the goals in place and keeping their feet to the fire, is the right way to go," said state Mineral Resources director Lynn Helms.

North Dakota’s Industrial Commission will be looking at what state mineral resources director Lynn Helms calls “tweaks” to its natural gas flaring policy.

Helms said the oil and gas industry is recommending the Commission keep the rules in place for both reservation and non-reservation lands, and wants the Commission to stick with its gas capture goals. But Helms said the rules might change when it comes to “stranded gas.”

The Public Service Commission has approved the expansion of an existing natural gas processing plant north of Killdeer.

OneOK’s Bear Creek plant will increase its capacity from 80 million cubic feet per day to 175 million cubic feet per day.

There are five projects underway or pending to expand or build gas processing in the Bakken.

"It's a major, major increase in North Dakota's gas processing capabilities," said PSC Chairman Randy Christmann. "It's going to take trucks off the road, reduce flaring and enhance the value of our gas production."

Xcel Energy has filed with the North Dakota Public Service Commission to collect an incentive payment for meeting reliability standards.

The incentive was part of a rate case several years ago. Xcel was having problems with power outages in the Fargo area. The incentive was added to that case, so if Xcel would reduce the number of outages, it would be eligible for the incentive. And the incentive would be between $250,000 and $1 million.

Under that rate case, if a customer experienced three or more outages in a year not due to weather, Xcel would pay $50.

The Public Service Commission has given its approval to Cenex to build a new produced fuels pipeline – to bring mainly diesel fuel from its Laurel, Montana refinery to Minot.

It’s a 181 mile pipeline. It replaces an existing 8 inch diameter pipeline with a 10 inch diameter pipeline. The line being replaced would run from Sidney, Montana to Minot. The PSC has jurisdiction over 150 miles of the new pipeline, in Williams, Mountrail and Ward Counties.

The new pipeline would carry 38,000 barrels a day – with a potential expansion to 60,000 barrels a day.

Bismarck-based Montana Dakota Utilities is buying an expansion of a wind farm in southwestern North Dakota.

MDU already owns the Thunder Spirit Wind Farm – first phase. It’s a 107.5 megawatt farm with 43 turbines. Allete Clean Energy developed it, and is developing the second phase, which will add another 16 turbines, and produce another 48 megawatts.

The flaring of natural gas in North Dakota dropped to 13 percent in December.

In November, that figure was 14 percent.

The highest amount of flaring comes from wells on the Fort Berthold Reservation, where 20 percent of gas was flared.

The state has an overall goal of reducing flaring to 12 percent by November. But state mineral resources director Lynn Helms said that may be tough to do. He said the one big impediment is securing rights-of-way on Bureau of Indian Affairs controlled land for new natural gas gathering pipelines.